- Hacker tells media they broke into publishing giant Scholastic
- They then stole confidential information about millions of people.
- Data will not be made public and was stolen ‘for fun’, hacker claims
Publishing and media giant Scholastic reportedly suffered a cyberattack in which it lost confidential information about millions of people.
A hacker with the alias “Parasocial” claims to have stolen data through an employee portal, including people’s names, email addresses, phone numbers and mailing addresses, of US clients and “educational contacts.” This last group represents approximately one million, out of a total of eight million entries.
In his report, daily point It says the database contains more than four million unique email addresses. Additionally, Parasocial provided its researchers with a sample, from which they were able to deduce that the data is legitimate. They didn’t communicate directly with the people, but came to some conclusions after reading their LinkedIn information and other social media accounts.
authentic sample
Scholastic is known for its books, educational materials, and popular series such as Harry Potter, The Hunger Games, and Goosebumps. Parents, teachers and administrators can register for an account on the platform. Parents must enter their child’s complete details and teachers must indicate the school they work for.
The attacker said their motives were simple entertainment and that they will not publish the files on the Internet.
“To Scholasticism; hahaha, let yourself be fooled. This is a lesson that must be learned the hard way. Don’t let your customers be affected by your security flaws, use MFA.” daily point quoted Parasocial as saying, adding that they would have taken even more information, but were stopped by the server’s export limits.
In a statement to daily pointA Scholastic representative said the company was investigating the claim.
“Scholastic takes the security of our customers’ data seriously with extensive systems and protocols, and is investigating this claim thoroughly,” they said.
